I've started to use -V0 as well, though it seems to usually stay between 180-210 kbps sometimes, and usually doesn't get above 220 kbps... hopefully, I'm not doing anything wrong. The kbps was even lower before I switched to "slow" ripping v0 (I use dbpoweramp).

I use 320 mp3. mp3 is compatible with everything and storage is so cheap and vast that I don't bother with any vbr. Plus, I get some comforting sense of having the best possible mp3 that soothes my OCD. I archive everything in FLAC with logs and cue sheets.

I use 320 mp3. mp3 is compatible with everything and storage is so cheap and vast that I don't bother with any vbr.

I only listen to MP3 on portable players, all with 32GB or less of storage. While that storage is relatively cheap, it is limited, so I use VBR at about 180kbps, which nearly doubles the number of files I can get on the devices compared to 320 kbps. And considering that I'm usually listening to those players while in a noisy gym, the sound quality is way more than adequate.

I use 320 mp3. mp3 is compatible with everything and storage is so cheap and vast that I don't bother with any vbr.

I only listen to MP3 on portable players, all with 32GB or less of storage. While that storage is relatively cheap, it is limited, so I use VBR at about 180kbps, which nearly doubles the number of files I can get on the devices compared to 320 kbps. And considering that I'm usually listening to those players while in a noisy gym, the sound quality is way more than adequate.

That's cool. I don't use any portable music devices. At the gym they have TVs on the treadmills. I do all my listening either at home on my computer, where I shuffle my music, or in my car, where I just listen to CDs old school style.

I don't use any portable music devices. At the gym they have TVs on the treadmills. I do all my listening either at home on my computer, where I shuffle my music, or in my car, where I just listen to CDs old school style.

Then why don't you simply listen to the FLAC files that you have? Why a need for MP3s at all?

I don't use any portable music devices. At the gym they have TVs on the treadmills. I do all my listening either at home on my computer, where I shuffle my music, or in my car, where I just listen to CDs old school style.

Then why don't you simply listen to the FLAC files that you have? Why a need for MP3s at all?

FLAC files are very large. Thus, instead of keeping them on my computer I archive them. Plus, I do a lot of manipulation to the mp3 files that I don't want to do to the flac files, things like renaming, retagging, replay gain, etc. The FLAC files are directly from rips and archived exactly as they are. Even with a 2TB drive flac fills it up pretty quickly whereas I can have weeks and weeks of music to shuffle with mp3 and still tons of room to add more. So, if I ever need to burn a disc, I have the flac album. If I ever need to encode to some other lossy format, I have the flac, etc.

You just got done saying "storage is so cheap". Which it is - you can store about 6000 CDs on a $100 2TB hard disk.

You allow your ripping software to tag those files, don't you? I retag my FLAC files after ripping, add ReplayGain tags, move the files, sometimes rename them. All of that "manipulation" is to the metadata only, and leaves the audio portion of the files completely untouched. I can still burn an exact duplicate of the CD using the CUE sheet that I generate during the ripping process, and use the files as source for generating MP3s.

You just got done saying "storage is so cheap". Which it is - you can store about 6000 CDs on a $100 2TB hard disk.

You allow your ripping software to tag those files, don't you? I retag my FLAC files after ripping, add ReplayGain tags, move the files, sometimes rename them. All of that "manipulation" is to the metadata only, and leaves the audio portion of the files completely untouched. I can still burn an exact duplicate of the CD using the CUE sheet that I generate during the ripping process, and use the files as source for generating MP3s.

If you rename them then you can't, unless you are willing to manually edit the cue sheet.

Also, I should have mentioned that I have some stuff where I have the mp3s but not a lossless rip. Long story short, it soothes my autism to do it the way I do it because I want them all to be uniform. We all have our ways I guess.

And yes, I use EAC to tag the files, but my desires for my mp3 tags are different. I use as little information as possible in those tags: artist, title, album, track # and year. That's it. For all 70 bajillion of them. I don't consider the tags important in an archived lossless format so I don't mess with them.

I have actually experienced file corruption when overwriting during tagging, so to some extent I understand the “don't touch my rip archive!” attitude. (Using generous padding upon first encoding should reduce the writing, though ... for those who wish to comfort their semiparanoia.)

But then I don't understand the purpose of a FLAC archive never to be played, and some MP3 everyday drive (unless for portable use, where space is still an issue) – when just by upsizing you can have another backup of your FLACs. My second set is in my office, on external USB drives. Files are created at home, with file ownership being Porcus@home, so my work computer denies my every attempt at changing or deleting ... I have to live with those junk tags. And unlike an untouched backup, this one is test run 250 days a year.

As a guard against “what the heck did I just write to file?”, I did once fiddle around with an OpenSolaris server setup with the awesome ZFS file system for snapshotting. But nowadays Windows users can set up the Volume Shadow Copy as well.

But then I don't understand the purpose of a FLAC archive never to be played, and some MP3 everyday drive (unless for portable use, where space is still an issue) – when just by upsizing you can have another backup of your FLACs.

It's because I'm extremely anal about the collection I listen to. I want them all to be uniform and not every one (but most) come from EAC Rips. Every single album in the collection I listen to is 320 and tagged the same way, etc. Plus, I have other things on the drives I use such as movies, etc.

It's just what makes me happy, it doesn't have to make sense to everyone. It's fun to hear what other people do though. I'm sure that when we have 50 tb hard drives or whatever it won't be an issue. At that point FLAC won't even be necessary, except for tagging I guess, but in my mind no tags are better than bad ones.

And yes, I use EAC to tag the files, but my desires for my mp3 tags are different. I use as little information as possible in those tags: artist, title, album, track # and year. That's it. For all 70 bajillion of them. I don't consider the tags important in an archived lossless format so I don't mess with them.

I do the same thing - lots of tags for flac (and my ogg vorbis has same as flac) but when I transcode to mp3 I just the basic 6 - artist album title track year genre - plus a comment (comment has version of lame used to encode)

I'm not a big fan of ID3 - maybe I'd be more tag happy in mp3 if I used ape or something, I don't know.